


THE BEGINNING

by addielouwho



Series: The Lion's Roar [1]
Category: Chronicles of Narnia - All Media Types, Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Not Related, Alternate Universe - What If Scenario, F/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, inspired by various historical events throughout the world and fantasy related fiction
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-27
Updated: 2019-06-05
Packaged: 2019-07-01 04:03:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Underage
Chapters: 3
Words: 14,258
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15766209
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/addielouwho/pseuds/addielouwho
Summary: AU: The Grand Duchess Helena of House Schon, an intimidating ruler of the duchy of Spare Oom, a bordering country of Narnia, vies for more power than she already has in abundance and is ready to give away two of her most precious commodities in order to do so. Those two commodities? Her daughters. Follow Lucy's journey as she goes from a young girl of six to the Queen she will one day be.A COMPLETE RE-WRITE!





	1. ONE

**Author's Note:**

> So, this was a little pet project I've been working on since I haven't had a computer. Narnia has been one of my first ever loves and fandoms and I am treating this story like my baby. I was inspired while rewatching Game of Thrones and historical drama tv shows and films over the summer and wanted to write something like that in the vein of Narnia. 
> 
> In this story, Susan and Lucy are sisters of the House of Schon in Spare Oom whilst Peter and Edmund are brothers of the royal House of Pevenise in Narnia.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So! This is a complete and total rewrite! I hope everyone is okay with that and I promise it will still keep the esscence of the original story alive!
> 
> Thank you for all the kind words on the original!

**THE LION’S ROAR**

**CHAPTER ONE**

**PART ONE: THE BEGINNING**

* * *

 

**BRIARGARTEN SCHLOSS**

**THE COUNTRY OF SPARE OOM**

**MARCH 21, 14,997 AC**

 

“Come, Lu!” Lucy’s sister’s voice carried from further inside the twisting and turning rose bush labyrinth that was encapsulated in between the outermost curtain wall of their home, Briargarten Schloss, and the second curtain wall which held their gardens. Briargarten resided deep within the fertile duchy of Spare Oom, a land filled with blooming fields of roses and farmlands full of fresh fruit with great hills, all of which were controlled by their family. “You have to do better than that!” Her voice was teasing yet it sparked anger in Lucy as she gathered the skirts of her light green gown with pink thread work and turned her body through the many passages in the rose labyrinth, searching through all of the hiding spots surrounding the massive castle that was all she had known for the six years of her little life.

 

Lucy and her sister were playing a game of hide and seek, one of little Lucy’s favorite pastimes--except when she was losing as she was now. She hated when her older sister, Susan, was the one who did the hiding for she always did a much better job of it than Lucy, sometimes making her look for hours on end, or at least until their governess put a stop to it. Lucy never had the talent for hiding like her sister--never being able to keep still for too long, but that didn’t stop her from loving the game. It was one of the only times she ever truly felt like she could let go and be free--to act like the child she was--away from their oppressive Mama.

 

Lucy’s gown was becoming stained at the hem the more she ran and tripped in the dirt, chasing futilely after her sister, but she paid no heed to it. She did not care in the moment that she was most likely going to be scolded by her Mother later for soiling her gown, all she cared about was finding her sister and putting an end to her turn, so Lucy could have a chance at hiding.

 

Deeper and deeper into the labyrinth she went, though she was unafraid of becoming lost. She had explored every nook and cranny of the maze since she could toddle along as a babe, and could easily find her way back out again. Lucy tried to step as lightly as her little feet could when her ears pricked to the sound of panting breath, making her believe that her sister was nearby.

 

“Do you give up, Lucy?” Susan called from away on the other side of the Blümen Road, which stretched far eastward toward Narnia and came right up through the Rosen Gate at Briargarten. The Blümen Road was the only thing that separated the rose labyrinth from one side to another at the front of the castle proper. 

 

“Never!” Lucy cried with a fierceness, though she silently cursed that her sister’s voice was so far away. She began running in that direction, narrowly avoiding a horse’s cart as she darted across the Blümen Road under the Rosen Gate, causing quite the commotion. By that time, she had completely put the sound of panting breath out of her mind as she made her way towards Susan’s voice.

 

Just as Lucy thought that she was getting closer to her victory, the culprit behind the panting breath revealed itself--it was Lucy and Susan’s governess, Countess Polliana, rushing towards Lucy as if her life depended on it, clutching her wimple in place in one hand and her voluminous skirts in the other. 

 

“My ladies!” She called breathlessly, her voice of a higher pitch than usual. Her watery grey eyes eyed the Blümen Road nervously before crossing it to get to Lucy, though they still held the nervousness even once they reached her; Lucy had paused in her tracks and had watched as her governess came closer. A rustle behind a large rose hedge revealed her sister, in all her black haired beauty that hung in ringlets on her shoulders, dressed in a purple day gown. She had given Lucy a look of victory before turning to their worried governess. “My ladies! Your Royal Mother requests your presence--at once!”

 

Lucy and Susan glanced at each other in confusion. They usually did not see their mother until suppertime, with their elder brother, Tirian; suppertime was always a quiet affair with their mother’s iciness, all of whatever warmth she had had when their father was alive (however small that was) gone with his soul.

 

Lucy’s heart began to race—their mother must have something very important to tell them if she was requesting their presence during the day, a time she always spent in her solar with her advisors and now their elder brother since he was now of an age of six-and-ten. Technically, since Tirian had come of age, he was now supposed to be recognized as the Royal Duke of Spare Oom, overseeing the upkeep of Briargarten and Spare Oom, but their mother deemed him not yet ready and their mother was quite an efficient and formidable woman.

 

No one wanted to oppose her authority, not even their headstrong brother.

 

“Come now,” Countess Polliana snapped, clapping her hands together before gesturing them forward. “You know how Her Royal Highness does not like to be kept waiting.” Sharing one last look, Susan and Lucy followed behind their governess silently, letting her lead the way out of the labyrinth and to a secret polished cobbled pathway that cut through the three tiers of curtain walls up the nicely symmetrical hill to Briargarten that kept it safe from invaders.

 

Briargarten Schloss was an impressive castle, with gleaming stone towers, some new and some old, depending on the width of them, and two large stone keeps from the beginning days of the Royal House of Schon. Briargarten was made of the most polished and gleaming stone, with parapets and arched windows like the ones Lucy had read about in the famed cathedrals of Narnia.

 

As Lucy and Susan followed their governess up and up the winding secret cobbled pathway through the garden that sat between the second and third innermost curtain walls of the outside of Briargarten, Lucy absently plucked a particularly pretty red rose from a towering bush, twisting it in her fingers almost nervously. One wrong twist and the thorns dug into the pads of her fingertips, though she did not gasp out in pain. In fact, she barely registered it as her mind swam with possibilities as to what their mother could possibly want from her and Susan. 

 

They finally reached the heavily guarded back passage that led into the castle proper; the guards took one look at their governess and her charges and let them in through the heavy cherry wood door without a word said. They passed inside and made their way towards the back of the castle, where an enormously tall and gleaming tower stood, going almost to the stars, where their royal mother’s solar sat.

 

Briargarten Schloss employed about seven hundred servants, ranging from the guards to the maids who cleaned out the chamber pots and the men who assisted their mother with upkeep of the castle and to keep her duchy secure; this did not even include the serfs who tilled the acres of fertile lands that laid to the northeast of the castle outside of Briargarten’s walls. 

 

Spare Oom and Briargarten in particular were known for their fertile lands that gave birth to a plentiful harvest, year after year, keeping not only the country of Spare Oom well fed, but other countries as well, making them a viable trading post. Traders from all over the world would come to Rosenmarkt just thirty miles southeast from Briargarten Schloss and heap thousands worth of fresh fruit and vegetables into large berlines to bring to their respective countries. And the person who had her hand in every single trading deal done, making her very, very rich was the Grand Duchess Helena of House Schon--Lucy, Susan, and Tirian’s mother, which made her a very powerful figure indeed.

 

Lucy twisted the rose ever more nervously in her fingers, ignoring the sting as the thorns dug deeper and deeper into her skin, causing blood to drip from her fingers and onto the nice castle floor. Her attention was only brought to it when she heard her sister gasp out and pry the rose from her hand delicately, holding it carefully in her own hand as she inspected Lucy’s.

 

“Lucy!” her sister admonished. “You really ought to be more careful.” 

 

Lucy jerked her hand away, quickening her pace to keep up with their governess, who did not notice their pause. “‘Tis fine, sister. Just a few cuts.”

 

“Still,” Susan said, tossing the rose away and easily catching up with Lucy with her longer, womanly strides. “Mother will be displeased when she sees the state of your hand and your dress.”

 

Lucy had almost forgotten about her dress, but as she looked down she was reminded once more of the dirt stains that marred the beautiful light green silk of her gown. Fighting a grimace at the thought of what her mother might say, Lucy feigned indifference, shrugging her shoulders and soldiering on. They passed the Sternenkirche, a place of worship. It was carved into a shape of a five-pointed star, the sign of Eule--their Mother Goddess.

 

Inside the main castle, it looked like a polished paradise, with every inch of the it covered in various displays of wealth and power from their royal house. There were beautiful stone statues of members of old of the Royal House of Schon and colorful tapestries detailing how they had come to be the royal house of Spare Oom that lined the halls. 

 

Towards the center of the palace, there was an atrium of colonnades that encircled a great man made waterfall that fell into a beautiful water garden, with vines crawling up the colonnades and flowers blooming in every direction. The water came from deep within the ground, stemming from the rushing river Blume that ran from north to south, coming from the icy rivers of Ettinsmoor and going all the way down around Briargarten and further still past the docks of Rosenmarkt, until it ended in the Cauldron Pool on the edge of the south of Narnia.

 

Passing by the water garden, they came upon the great stone tower and entered, beginning to climb the shiny stone steps up to Lucy and Susan’s mother’s solar where she kept council almost day in and day out. They took the stone steps quickly, not pausing to catch their breath although Lucy felt as though she’d run for miles by the time they reached the top.

 

More guards stood at the entrance to the solar, these ones being Briargarten’s famous Rosenritters, a particular group of knights known for their chivalry and prowess in battle. Their sole purpose was to guard the Royal Duchess and her family. Lucy always liked them, for they would sneak her sweeties when her mother wasn’t looking. One of them smiled at her now and gave her a little wink before banging the end of his golden staff on the floor, announcing, “Make way for Their Royal Highnesses, the Archduchesses Susanne and Lucille of House Schon and their governess, Countess Polliana.”

 

The gold-banded silver door swung open and revealed their royal mother, deep in conversation with her advisors and a strange man stood beside them, with a monocle on one of his watery blue eyes and dressed in such an elaborate way Lucy had never seen before. When Lucy and Susan entered, their mother, the advisors, and the strange man looked up from her various stacks of parchment on her rosewood desk.

 

The solar was unlike anything else in the palace--where most of Briargarten was open and light, their mother’s solar was drawn and dark and somehow cold despite the beginnings of spring’s warmth. Lucy never failed to shiver when she entered the solar.

 

The Grand Duchess Helena surveyed her daughters once she looked up from her pieces of parchment, her icy blue eyes looking each one of them up and down in turn. As always, she was dressed in a heavy woolen black dress, that she had taken to wearing ever since their father had passed a little more than a year ago. Her dark black hair was braided up and away from her face and covered with black gable hood. The only adornment on her person came from a sterling silver locker with Eule’s five-pointed star on the front and it held a portrait of their Papa and was nestled upon her bosom, right above her heart.

 

Their mother was a scary and formidable woman, having been raised as the son and sole heir their grandfather, an already great ruler of Spare Oom in his own right, never had. She had to learn to be ruthless when necessary but coy and cunning at other times, for so many in Spare Oom dared to question her right to rule. For in Spare Oom, a woman could not inherit unless expressibly bid by their father, as was the case with their mother and grandfather, since he had no living male heirs.

 

Still, there were people who doubted, for in most of the world, a woman could not inherit--period.

 

The Grand Duchess Helena had proved all of their whispers wrong not a second after her father’s body was cold, when the ruler on the monopoly of trade had been struck into question at his death, a critical moment in Spare Oom’s history. She had made her move then, an unseemly one at first, for she married the second son of a lower house, but she knew he had value.

 

Their late father, Olivar of House Kant, had once been a great warrior and fought with King James XX of Narnia in Ettinsmoor against the Ettins and thus had many swords pledged to him, for he was made a knight of Narnia for his valor, despite being of Spare Oom. He had been married once before but it was proved childless, as his wife and child died in childbed. He met their mother many years before she married him and had fallen in love with her immediately, for  she was a great beauty, once upon a time.

 

Together, they swiftly ended the fighting her father’s death had caused amongst the higher houses of Spare Oom, quickly shutting down anyone who would dare to try and take her duchy from her. After many thwarted attempts, the people of Spare Oom and others from around the world seemed to have given up, acknowledging the new ruler of Spare Oom and of House Schon as a cunning woman who could always see ten steps ahead of her opponents and who would always seek to better her house further, no matter the cost. And as little Lucy squirmed underneath the scrutiny of her mother and the strange man with the monocle, she would soon come to realize just how true that was.

 

The Grand Duchess Helena raked her cold blue eyes over her daughters, any light or warmth that may have regarded them when they first entered the solar, decorated with mounted stags heads and portraits from their grandfather’s time and beyond, disappearing quickly as she took in the dirt upon the hem of Lucy’s gown and her blood soaked hand.

 

“What is this?” their mother finally spoke and Lucy tensed. Her mother always spoke with a quiet and calm voice that did nothing to hide the steel-forged iron underneath. “Countess Polliana, you dare bring my youngest to me thus? Her gown is a soiled mess and her hand a bloody ruin! I trust you can get her cleaned up, at least?”

 

Lucy looked at her governess who was looking at the gown and blushing furiously. “Yes, Your Royal Highness,” she said to the ground.

 

“Good. Now take her away. I have need to speak to my eldest daughter without Lucille soiling the moment.”

 

Lucy bit her lip to keep the tears at bay. She didn’t understand why she should be scolded thus. She was just a child, after all.

 

Wasn’t she?

 

But one look into her mother’s eyes, that had hardened considerably, said differently. “Go, now,” said the Grand Duchess, waving them away. “I cannot look on my daughter’s soiled form a moment longer.” Lucy braved a look at Susan as a nervous Countess Polliana lead her away, seeing her own fears projected into Susan’s twin blue eyes, same as Lucy’s and their brother’s.

 

Just what did their mother want with Susan?

* * *

Lucy was brought to her apartments which were situated at the top of the smaller but still beautiful square keep meant for the children and the keep’s servants down in the lower part of the keep, under the ground. The Small Keep, as it was called, was connected by a colonnade bridge to the Large Keep, where it housed their mother and great guests of honor. The Great Keep was enormous and decorated like a palace within a palace, and Lucy always loved to go and look around at the beautiful decorations. The Small Hall, where the family ate for normal meals, was set at the bottom of the Small Keep whereas the Great Hall was situated across the water garden from the two keeps.

 

Lucy’s apartments were open and spacious, with large windows that gave her a good view of the wide, winding river Blume to the north of her rooms. She could always see people sailing up and down the river on pleasure barges or much larger ships like trading ships. She liked to play a game where she guessed who and what they were doing exactly on the river Blume, the more ridiculous the better, but she did not want to do that that day.

 

Once she was taken to her apartments, her governess had her handmaidens immediately draw her a bath, so that they could scrub the day’s activities away from her body whilst getting rid of her soiled gown. They scrubbed and scrubbed and cleaned her bloody hands, wrapping them in gauze when she was all dressed again and clean.

 

Lucy spent the rest of the day in her bedchambers, the last of her apartment rooms, trying to distract herself from thoughts of what was transpiring between her sister, their mother, and that strange man by playing war with her dolls or a game of Blind Man’s Bluff with her governess and handmaids, but it did little to help. Hours passed and her sister never came to see her. Lucy’s stomach twisted as she wondered just what it was that kept her sister from her so. She even wondered if her brother was up there with them too, trying to learn his duties as Royal Duke.

 

At last, the sun began to set behind the lush green of the trees, turning the sky into beautiful hues of purple and pink and orange, the signal that it was time for supper. Governess Polliana smoothed down Lucy’s gown of crushed blue velvet nervously before a knock sounded at the door and she called in her small voice, “Come in.”

 

It was her brother, Tirian, a golden youth with a charming smile and even more charming disposition. Lucy absolutely adored him. “Brother!” she exclaimed, running into his arms, ignoring her governess’ rebukes of ruining her dress once more. “What are you doing here? Aren’t we to eat in the Small Hall?”

 

He smiled down at her and kissed her hair, saying, “I am afraid not, dear one. We are take supper in the Great Hall.”

 

“The Great Hall?” Lucy wondered aloud. “Why?” The Great Hall was used only for formal meals, usually for feasts to celebrate religious days or marriages or great guests. It would include singers and dancers and jesters, plates and plates of the most savory foods and wonderful decorations. Lucy thought on nights like tonight, they would have their small meals in the Small Hall, no grand performances.

 

“Because an important person is here.”

 

“The man with the funny glass on his eye?” Tirian laughed and took her arm, assuring her governess he would escort her to the Great Hall himself. Lucy smiled up at him, though her heart was racing.

 

Tirian, at an age of six-and-ten, was a handsome youth. He had the golden hair of their father that curled around his ears and his height too, whilst his eyes was like his younger sisters of their mother--icy blues. He was dressed in the finery of their house colors: red and gold, decorated with the roses of their house across his doublet. Girls from all over the country vied for his hand in marriage and were wooed by his charm and kindness. Lucy always thought he was an amazing brother and loved him very much.

 

He led her down the stairs of the Small Keep and they made their way across the palace yard, passing by the water garden. Now that Lucy was not thinking of what her mother wanted with her, for her brother was with her, she noticed that the servants were scuttling around, trying to make the palace look even more beautiful than it was. There were small, beautiful golden candle lit lanterns hanging all around to give light to the yard as sunset went into night. 

 

Finally, they arrived at the Great Hall and a Rosenritter announced them. The enormous doors swung open and Lucy was surprised to see a great feast being held, with Susan sitting at the place of honor beside their mother, with the strange old man on the other side of her. Tirian led Lucy up to the dias.

 

The Grand Duchess rose from her golden gilded chair and gestured that Lucy come to her. Hesitantly, with Tirian discreetly pushing her forward on the small of her back, Lucy approached her mother after a look at her sister. 

 

Susan looked paler than normal and was pushing at her food, looking almost scared. Lucy’s heart began to beat fast again and she felt as though she was going to be ill, despite having not eaten anything since dinner. 

 

“Ah, Lucille,” her mother said as Lucy gave a small curtsy before going between her mother’s open and expectant arms, allowing her mother to appraise her once more, taking in her clean gown and the crown of her head covered in a dark blue and silver cap strung with pearls. Her light brown hair barely touched her shoulders, unlike the long dark tresses of her sister which were tied back in a braid with ribbon covering it, but she seemed to please her mother enough, for the Grand Duchess pulled back and said, “That’s much better. Cleanliness is close to holiness, Lucille. Remember that.”

 

“Yes, Mama,” Lucy said to the floor before being allowed to sit beside her brother who sat beside their sister. Unlike his two sisters, Tirian was eating happily, his mouth full of suckling pig and other various roasted meats and sweets.

 

Lucy was busy trying to get her sister’s attention, who was staring straight ahead. That denoted that she was thinking of something rather serious and Lucy always hated when she got that look, for she became unbearable and no fun. 

 

Upset, Lucy turned away and watched as the actors relayed a play that told the story of their Mother Goddess, Eule, with everyone in the Great Hall, except the strange man, making the sign of Her when She gave Her protection speech over Spare Oom, even Susan, though she seemed to do it automatically and not piously.

 

Curious, Lucy leaned over her brother and inquired to the strange man once the play was over and the bards began, “Are you not from Spare Oom, sir?”

 

Her mother scoffed. “Lucille! What have I told you about saying whatever comes to your mind?”

 

The strange man smiled, though it seemed like a snake before he was about to strike. Lucy did not like him. “It’s quite alright, Your Royal Highness. No, madam, I am not from Spare Oom.”

 

“Where are you from?”

 

“The country of Narnia, Your Royal Highness.”

 

“Narnia?! Really? Why are you  _ here _ ?”

 

“Lucy!” her sister snapped suddenly. “Be silent!”

 

Stung, Lucy drew away and did not talk for the rest of the night, just picking at her food until her mother allowed her to go to bed, for she was much younger than her other siblings and was required to be in bed no matter the occasion. Her governess came to her at the dias and curtsied deferinitally at her mother and the strange man from Narnia before leading Lucy back to her apartments to be dressed for bed. 

 

As her governess oversaw her handmaidens undressing her, unlacing her dress and undergarments, taking off her headdress and placing her in her night chemise that wasn’t as heavy for the night’s were getting warmer, Lucy made inquiries of her. “Countess?” She asked as they took off the arms of her dress, revealing the chemise underneath.

 

“Hmmm?” Her governess asked, yawning as she stitched a golden rose in the corner of Lucy’s bedchamber.

 

“Why is Susan acting so?”

 

Her governess looked up. “What do you mean, Your Royal Highness?”

 

“She snapped at me today,” Lucy mumbled, tears filling her eyes once more as she remembered the feast. Lucy noticed as her governess colored, for she must of known  _ something _ , but she only said:

 

“She’s just tired, Lady Lucille. As well you should be,” she said as they dressed Lucy in her nightgown and began drawing the light curtains of her windows. They were made of silk so as to get a nice breeze through her rooms and her governess led her to bed.

 

“But she seemed fine before she talked to Mama,” Lucy insisted as she was put to bed, the silk coverlets covering her small body in her featherbed. She did think that talking with Mama alone always put Lucy in a bad mood, but her sister was too dignified for that.

 

“Well, you will just have to ask her on the morrow,” her governess said, gently smoothing back her hair. “I’m sure she will feel better and will tell you.”

 

“Or she will never speak to me again,” Lucy grumbled, fidgeting with her coverlet.

 

Countess Polliana laughed. “I highly doubt that, little one. Now, close your eyes and dream good dreams. May Eule bless you.”

 

“May Eule bless you as well, governess.” Lucy closed her eyes and tried to do as she said. She could hear the handmaidens blow out her candles and her governess draw the drapes to her bed before all was dead silent in her bedchamber and Lucy had no choice but to try to sleep, though she hated the entire dark.

 

Sleep did not come.

 

She laid awake for hours, thinking on what made her sister in such a bad mood. Her young mind conjured up all sorts of horrible things, like Susan was to be sacrificed to that snake-like man, who was actually a basilisk in disguise and would gobble her up, bones and all. Lucy shuddered at the thought of her sister gone in the belly of a large snake.

 

Just before she fell into a restless sleep, tears in her eyes, there came a small knocking at her door and she sat up right straight in her bed, fearing she had imagined it. Then, it came again and she knew it was true. It was the gay little knock she and her siblings had for one another when they wished to speak privately. It sounded in three short successive knocks before two longer apart ones, all used in a happy tune.

 

Even now, Susan used a happy tune, for Lucy knew it was her.

 

Lucy wiped her tears away quickly and jumped from her bed before going to her bedchamber door, listening as her sister said, “...Lucy? Are you awake? I must speak with you.”

 

Delighted, Lucy threw open the door and was greeted with the sight of her sister, holding a pure golden candelabra and dressed in a chemise which was covered with a dark blue night robe, decorated with gold lining and dagged sleeves, with her long, black tresses falling through the hood. “May I come in?” Susan asked hesitantly and Lucy immediately nodded, letting her in and giving a smile to the guard at the door who put a finger to his lips.

 

As Susan passed Lucy into the bedchamber, she noticed that her sister was even paler than usual and wan with her eyes were red-rimmed; Lucy felt her heart jump, for that meant she had been crying a long time.

 

Lucy closed the door behind her sister and joined her where she sat on the bed, from where she drew the drapes back and placed the candelabra on the rosewood bedside table, where the candlelight illuminated them in a eerie hellish glow. 

 

Lucy suppressed a shudder and her heart beat like a snare drum in her chest; she was afraid.

 

“...Susan? What’s wrong? Why did you snap at me tonight?” Lucy was almost afraid to ask by the look on her sister’s face, but she knew she must if she wanted to make Susan happy again.

 

Susan avoided the big question at first and just said, “You are turning seven this year, Lucy.”

 

Lucy didn’t understand. “Yes…” she said, hesitantly.

 

“Almost a woman grown.” Susan’s voice sounded so far away, as if in another world. Her eyes were roaming over all the little things of Lucy’s bedchamber: from the dolls that were arranged neatly in a scene of battle, to the abandoned effort of the spinning wheel by the window. Susan smiled sadly at it all.

 

Lucy laughed nervously. “I’m only going to be seven, Su.”

 

Susan looked at her and her face melted, grasping Lucy’s hand in hers--clammy and cold--tightly. “I’m sorry I snapped at you tonight, Lu. I’ve just been so afraid.”

 

Lucy’s heart nearly stopped. “Afraid of what?” she whispered.

 

“My future. That is what Mama and the Duke of the Lantern Waste wished to speak to me about.”

 

“The man with the glass eye? From Narnia?”

 

Susan laughed lightly. “Yes, him.”

 

“What does he have to do with your future?”

 

“He is an envoy of King James XX of Narnia. He has come here to arrange a marriage.”

 

“Whose marriage?”

 

Susan smiled tightly and Lucy could see tears in her beautiful eyes. “Mine, Lucy.”

 

The world stopped. Lucy almost pulled her hands from her sister’s in shock, but the look on Susan’s face told her she needed to hold on. Instead, she nearly shouted, “Married?! To whom?!”

 

Susan smiled a little at Lucy’s questions, natural for a girl her age and for someone like Lucy, so headstrong and independent. “I’m three-and-ten, almost four-and-ten, Lucy,” she tried to explain. “And already flowered. It is high time for me to be married, or at least that is what Mama said.”

 

“Does Tirian know?”

 

“Not yet,” Susan said. “I do not think he will take it well.”

 

_ Nor I _ thought Lucy grimly but instead she asked the question she was burning to know, “Wh--who are you to marry?” Lucy shivered. She thought of her own age of six and realized of what her sister meant earlier. It was only a matter of time before Lucy was married off as well, bartered off like some calf to an old toad. She did not like the sound of that.

 

“Crown Prince Peter of Narnia--next May.”

 

Lucy’s childish blue eyes grew wide. Crown Prince Peter was no toad, or so it was told. “A prince? You are going to be a  _ queen _ ?” She whispered, frightened of the implications that statement brought. Even she knew that a queen had even more responsibilities than even a daughter of a Grand Duchess, especially the country of Narnia. By the look on Susan’s face, she was thinking that also. “You are going to leave? All the way to Cair Paravel?”

 

“Yes,” Susan whispered, her twin blue eyes shining with tears in the illumination of the candlelight.

 

“I don’t want you to go,” Lucy began to sob and Susan pulled her close, smoothing down her hair in motherly gesture. It only made Lucy cry more, for she realized that only her sister and brother held her thus, never their mother, and in a years’ time, Susan would be gone.

 

Perhaps for good.

 

“Shush, now,” Susan said, though Lucy could hear the tears in her voice but she kept them at bay. The sisters were so different in so many ways but Susan had always been Lucy’s best friend since birth, almost competing with her elder brother. She was almost her only true confidant in a palace controlled by their mother, doubly so now that their father was gone. “I do not want to go, either,” Susan confessed after a bit of silence. 

 

“Do not leave me alone with Mama,” Lucy cried. “She doesn’t love me like she loves you.”

 

“Oh, Lu,” Susan pulled back and kissed Lucy’s forehead. “She loves you, just as much as I.”

 

Lucy did not believe her but she said nothing, only burrowing further into Susan’s arms. “I don’t want to leave, Lucy, but I must. For the good of the family and our house. And one day, it will be your burden to bear.”

 

“I do not want to marry,” Lucy mumbled in Susan’s bosom. “I want to be free,  _ forever _ .”

 

Susan laughed lightly, choked a little by the tears in her throat. “I am afraid life does not work like that, little one.”

 

“Life is unfair,” Lucy mumbled.

 

“Aye,” Susan agreed. “But one day, when you grow up and become a woman, you will learn to live with it. Same as I.”

 

Lucy pulled back at Susan’s tone and looked into her eyes. “You do not seem to be very happy about it.”

 

“You do not have to be happy about it, you just have to accept it. Accept it and endure. As all women do.”

 

Lucy hated the thought of that and when she finally went to sleep that night, with her sister’s arms wrapped around her, she dreamed of marrying a man with the head of silver lion. It roared angrily when she kissed him and it shivered her down to her bones when she awoke.

  



	2. TWO

**BRIARGARTEN SCHLOSS**

**THE COUNTRY OF SPARE OOM**

**14,998 AC**

 

The next year passed much too quickly for Lucy’s liking. She never had experienced life go by so fast before; usually it went by too slow for Lucy’s liking so she would pray to Eule and Her stars that it would speed up, either for a birthday or some other kind of celebration. Her own birthday had come and gone in early June, thankfully with the Duke of the Lantern Waste long gone by then, and she was now another year older but perhaps not another year wiser. Lucy grimaced at she thought about it in early February of the year 14,998, for it seemed she had gotten her wish at last when she no longer wanted it.

 

Lucy had hoped against hope that her sister’s engagement to Crown Prince Peter of Narnia was some kind of jest--that it wasn’t really going to happen--but it was not. It was real and it was coming  _ fast _ . After she realized that, she thought that at least she would get to spend some time with her sister before her upcoming nuptials, but that too proved nigh on impossible.

 

Susan was always in lessons with their mother on courtly life as befit a queen--for she was deemed too old to have Governess Polliana now--on history, language, archery lessons, and dancing. Their mother, when she was young, had been sent by her father to learn from the women within the Narnian court in the midst of King James XX’s rule when he himself was young. The women there were infamous for the cunning and ruthlessness amongst their peers, along with their ability to appear as graceful and courteous as a beautiful swan.

 

The Grand Duchess of Spare Oom learned well.

 

Lucy remembered the day in high August, when her sister had her portrait painted to be sent to the Crown Prince. Susan had been dressed in the style of the Narnian court of long dagged sleeves and dragging trains, towering braids and rouge on the lips and cheeks. Lucy had laughed at how silly her sister looked and Tirian had to hide his smile behind his fist as Susan sat in a regal position upon a gilded chair before the court painter that painted their sister’s likeness but they were quickly shut up by their mother’s withering look before she looked back at her daughter. She almost looked happy at the chain of events transpiring and she was fingering the locket about her neck.

 

Lucy never got the chance to play with her sister anymore, a fact that depressed her greatly. She missed running through the rose labyrinth, hot on her sister’s heels. She missed sneaking into the enormous kitchen late at night and stealing some bread and cheese with apple cider for a midnight picnic on the grounds with her siblings. They were both so busy now, Susan the most so and Lucy missed her. She missed Susan’s comforting presence by her side as Lucy raged about spinning lessons and the like.

 

Now, Lucy spent most of her time with her governess, sitting in her own lessons about the history of the world and their own religions, how to write and speak in several languages-- _ she was dismal at it _ \--amongst other things and she was absolutely, incredibly bored. To be fair, she wasn’t exactly a good student, prefering to distract her governess with ploys to play or to find her sister and be with her. It did not work that much anymore, until that one day in early February.

 

Lucy had become increasingly agitated by that time, realizing that in just three short months, her sister would be gone from her, perhaps forever. Her heart had begun to race nearly everyday, and she had begun to make herself ill from it to the exasperation of her mother, who thought it weak that she was nervous about her sister leaving.

 

“Goodbyes are a part of life, Lucille,” the Grand Duchess scolded her one day after she had gotten ill in her chamber pot for the third time in a row that day. She was bedridden, for Countess Polliana was afraid that she had caught an illness, but her mother had taken one look at her and knew it was just nerves and had a draught prepared for her to take every night.

 

And it was still nerves as she stared out the frosty window of her tutoring room that was located in a middle room of the Small Keep. She was sitting at a window bench as she listened to her governess recount the tale of their Mother Goddess, Eule, who had been created as the Great Northern Star to protect the people of Spare Oom who had fled Narnia to the Eastern wilderness and it’s hillsides in fear of the Terrible Plagues that were brought upon by King Henry the Disastrous of Narnia in the year 5,000 AC.

 

Lucy had heard the story before, time and time again, so she sat listlessly as she watched the snow that had been falling intermittently since early December begin to finally melt, falling like dew droplets off the vines that crawled up and around the palace. She sighed, saddened by the message the melting snow brought her.

 

Her governess heard her sigh and closed the large tome with a resounding  _ snap! _ and reprimanded her, her watery grey eyes hard as she said, “Your Royal Highness, are you listening to a word I’ve said?”

 

“Yes, sweet governess,” Lucy sighed again, turning to Countess Polliana with sad eyes. Her governess always saw the truth in Lucy’s eyes as her siblings did. In that moment, Lucy thought of her governess more like a mother to her than her own. The thought brought tears to her eyes. “It’s just,” she sniffed, willing her tears away. “I’ve heard this story so many times before and--and seeing the snow begin to melt is making me sad.”

 

Countess Polliana’s eyes had softened considerably by now, for she saw the true pain in Lucy’s eyes and knew it wasn’t just the melting snow that was making her sad. She smiled sadly and said, “I understand, Your Highness. I suppose our lessons may end early today and we could go for a walk on the grounds, if Your Highness would like?” At Lucy’s brightening look, her governess put the tome down and stood up, motioning for Lucy to do the same. They made their way back to Lucy’s apartments, with two Rosenritters following a few paces behind, as always. It was their duty to keep the Grand Duchess’ family safe.

 

Once back in Lucy’s bedchambers, her handmaidens had her dressed for the cold, tying on a white winter cloak over Lucy’s grey gown, the sleeves lined with ermine as was the hood of the cloak which was brought over her head to hide her cap beaded with silver stones to compliment the last of the winter white. They slid on pure white gloves over her hands whilst her governess had her own cloak slid over her shoulders and her ermine muff for her hands.

 

They left the Small Keep, making their way through the inner palace yard until they reached the large wooden gate that lead to the polished, cobbled path that led through the curtain walls until they reached the right of the outside of the castle, where there was about an acre stretch of land all covered in snow before there was a large flower patch that reached as far as the eye could see. All the flowers across the patch were covered in frost and snow, and to Lucy, despite her sadness, thought it looked beautiful; the servant’s children were there in the blank stretch of land, enjoying the pure white snow whilst they still could. The boys were throwing melting snowballs at each other whilst the girls where making snow stars.

 

When one of the servant boys noticed her, he yelled to the other children and they stopped their playing, all standing to attention and bowing or curtsying to her, albeit clumsily. Lucy laughed a little, smiling and waving her hand, letting them stop their deferences. “No need for that!” she said to the children. She hated all the pomp and circumstance of her life. “I wish to play with you, is that alright?”

 

One of the servant girls blushed and looked to the snow on the ground. “Of course, Your Royal Highness. We would be honored.”

 

“Let’s play!” Lucy said and the servant children hollered with happiness and they all began running around the outside grounds, with the boys throwing the melting snow at each other again and the girls fell back to the ground with laughter and giggles. 

 

Lucy decided she was going to do both, throwing snowballs when the boys weren’t looking and then falling to the ground to form snow stars as soon as they looked to see who it was, causing a great war between the boys when they thought it was one of them. She could hear her governess and the Rosenritters laughing from where Countess Polliana was sat on a stone bench whilst going through her book of prayers.

 

As she laid down to form another snow star, moving her arms and legs back and forth hastily with her eyes tightly shut and her mouth spread wide in a smile, she heard one of the servant girls shout, “Look! It’s The Archduchess Susanne and the Grand Duke Tirian!” 

 

At those words, Lucy’s eyes snapped open and she looked around the grounds though she could not see them. Confused, Lucy looked to the girl who shouted and saw that she was pointing up at the palace.

 

Lucy looked up and saw her sister and brother, standing at a window in the Great Keep, in deep conversation with their mother. When Susan looked up and saw Lucy laying on the ground in the snow, she smiled a bit and waved but was soon motioned away by their frowning mother. Suddenly terrified and sad, Lucy bolted up, her cloak hood falling down. Her stomach churned angrily in her stomach and she felt she would be sick at any moment.

 

Sensing trouble, her governess stood up and rushed over to Lucy. “Your Highness, is everything alright?”

 

“I--I must get to my rooms,” Lucy said. Something was hurting with every thought, scarring her insides. “I feel ill.”

 

“What’s wrong, milady?” One of the servant girls she was playing with asked.

 

“None of your business!” Lucy snapped and dragged herself up, ignoring the hurt look on the little girl’s face.

 

“My lady!” Countess Polliana yelled after her, the guards chasing behind as Lucy rushed up to the palace, uncaring that she was covered in melting snow. “I do not care if you  _ are _ ill, I know your mother raised you better than that!”

 

“No!” Lucy cried at her from behind, likely causing a scene. “My father and siblings did! Not her!” She ran up the secret pathway to the palace, rushing up the stair into the Small Keep where her apartments where, tears running down her face in rivulets as she screamed at her governess, “Now, LEAVE ME ALONE!” She shut the door to her bedchamber in her governess’ shocked face and locked it.

 

“ _ Your Royal Highness _ ! You unlock this door this  _ instant _ or I will call on your mother! She will not be happy about this!” Her governess banged on the door but Lucy did not care what her governess was saying, for she had flung herself on her bed, tears streaming down her face. She laid there crying for what felt like hours, crying her heart out until it felt like she had no more tears left to cry but then she heard a knock at the door, that secret little knock.

 

It was her sister.

 

Lucy sat up from her bed in shock, for she had not seen her sister face to face for many days, perhaps even a week. She was always with their mother, and they had taken to eating their meals in their mother’s rooms. Lucy quickly wiped away the rest of what remained of her tears and went to her door, slowly.

 

“Who is it?” She asked quietly, even though she knew exactly who it was.

 

“Your dear sister, Lucy,” come the soft, gentle voice of Susan. “Please, I pray you unlock the door and let me in.”   
  


Lucy hesitated a moment before unlocking the door and looked up at her sister. At seeing her beautifully soft face, so full of warmth and kindness for her younger sister, Lucy burst into tears again and embraced her sister into her arms.

 

Susan pulled Lucy into her bedchamber and shut the door behind her, barring it once more, before taking her into her arms and leading her to the bed. She held her until Lucy finally stopped crying, stroking her growing brown hair all the while. When Lucy was finished, she pulled back and Susan wiped her tears away, saying, “I wish to ask for your forgiveness, sweet sister.”

 

“ _ My _ forgiveness?!” Lucy asked incredulously. “I have acted badly today. It was not you that--”

 

“Yes,” said Susan with a look in her eye that told Lucy that she was as sad as her. “It was me. I have been so busy with lessons on being the perfect wife for Prince Peter and future Queen of Narnia with Mama that I have completely neglected you, haven’t I? We used to have fun together, didn’t we?”

 

“Yeah,” Lucy mumbled, smiling a bit. “Until you got boring!”

 

“Oh, really?” Susan teased, but she saw that Lucy was still looking down, her twin blue eyes as sad as river run dry. She tucked her finger under Lucy’s chin, making her look up at her. “I miss having fun with you, too, dear one. As does Tirian. But I am afraid we may never have fun again as siblings. When I leave for Narnia, Tirian will be managing Briargarten with Mama and I will be gone. That is what I will miss the most--having fun.”

 

Lucy felt tears prick her eyes once more. “Me too,” she whispered. “I wish you didn’t have to go.”

 

“I know,” Susan said, her voice becoming choked. “But it is for the good of the fam--”

 

“I hate that saying,” Lucy said, grumbling and Susan laughed a little.

 

“Me too,” she said. “But it is true. I must face my future with bravery, as will Tirian and as will you one day.”

 

“How do you know?”

 

Susan smiled conspiratorially. “What is our nickname for you?”

 

Lucy smiled, blushing and looking to the ground. “Your little Valiant.” Then she looked up, suddenly serious for such a young age. “But I’m not,” she insisted. “I’m scared of a lot of things--like the dark, and Mama, an--”

 

“I think everybody is afraid of Mama,” joked Susan. “Even Tirian.”

 

Lucy couldn’t help but laugh a little and then she gasped, suddenly happy. “When you become Queen of Narnia, you won’t have to be afraid of her anymore!”

 

Susan gasped herself, humoring her. “That’s right! Maybe there is something joyous to look forward to in this marriage after all.” They both began to laugh, imagining Susan being able to hold herself higher than their prideful mother, putting her down a peg or two. After a moment, they calmed down and Susan looked at Lucy again. 

 

“Lucy,” she began slowly. “There is something else I wish to tell you.”

 

“What?”

 

“I will be leaving soon.”

 

Lucy was confused, blinking. “I know,” she said. “Three months from now.”

 

“No,” Susan shook her head slowly. “Mama is taking me to St. Staeorra’s clochar.”

 

“What? Why?” A clochar was a holy place, where females would go and pledge their love to the Mother Goddess, living their life in constant prayer and holiness, studying their Goddess’ stars and what they meant in their ever-changing patterns. Some said that the priestess’ of the clochar had magic and St. Staeorra’s was the most famous clochar in Spare Oom, where some high born ladies would go and stay for education. “I thought you were to marry Prince Peter?”

 

“I am, silly one. I am going to have my fortune told by the Fiadh.” Lucy gasped. The Fiadh was the High Priestess of the entire faith of Eule, able to read a person’s future. She lived in St. Staeorra’s clochar in total seclusion, watching the stars day and night. It was said she was a star herself.

 

“Why?” Lucy asked again. The prospect frightened her.

 

“It is tradition,” explained Susan. “I must go and hear my fortune three months before I depart.:

 

“And what if it is bad?”

 

“Then that is  _ fate _ .”

* * *

Lucy watched with the rest of the household staff, with her governess on one side of her and her brother Tirian on the other, holding her hand as they stood on the large stone steps at the bottom of the Great Keep, where the Blühen Road came straight to the front in an arch as Susan and their mother were packed into their carriage for their journey to the northlands of Spare Oom. Lucy gave a small wave to her sister where she sat in the carriage in the front of the small berline, and Susan returned the wave and a smile in return before the coachman snapped his reins and they were off for two whole weeks at the beginnings of March.

 

During that time, Lucy was forced to stay in lessons, day in and day out, no fun for her for the trouble she had caused her governess, though she had apologized to her profusely and her mother, but still, her mother demanded discipline for her. Every ploy she tried to use on Countess Polliana would not work and it was causing her great frustration. There was nothing for her to do, except sit in lessons and worry; not even her dear brother could give her much time, for in their mother’s absence he was left as the Grand Duke and had to take care of the household and their duchy. Even when Lucy would get sick over the fact that the time for her sister to truly depart was getting closer and closer, her governess would just give her her draught and pull her bodily out of bed if need be.

 

She had to work on her spinning, trying to get her yarn to be even and not lumpy. She had to work at it until her fingers felt cramped and could barely move them after each day. She was also forced to work on her posture and her speaking of the languages she was to learn. In short, Lucy was absolutely miserable.

 

When she finally saw her sister and mother’s small berline lumber up the Blühen Road back to the castle, passing under the grand Rosen Gate until they reached the arched roadway at the front of the Great Keep, Lucy leapt from her spinning wheel in her tutoring room, shouting, “She’s here! They’re here!” Taking off before her governess could say anything, she made her way from her tutoring rooms, going through corridor after corridor, passing guards and servants and the like. She slammed open the Small Keep’s doors and ran under the colonnades that connected the bottom of the Small Keep to the doors of Great Keep. 

 

When she got there, shouted happily, “Susan!” But when her sister was helped out her carriage from their small berline by their mother, of all people, made her pause. Susan’s face was pale and wan-- _ frightened _ \--and it seemed like she didn’t even see Lucy. “Sis--sister? What’s wrong?”

 

“Do not bother your sister right now, Lucille,” their mother was holding Susan’s arm, helping her past Lucy and onto the pathway leading to the Small Keep towards Susan’s own apartments. “We have a lot to prepare for.” Grand Duchess Helena and Susan hurried to Susan’s rooms, barely taking notice of Lucy, who hurried after them.

 

“Yes,” said Lucy, trying to catch her breath as she raced after them. “Susan’s wedding.” She was worried and confused as to why Susan would barely even look at her, letting their mother clutch her tightly and help her inside.

 

When they got inside the Small Keep, they were met with Tirian, who must have seen the berline too. “Mother! Sister! You are back! How happy I am--”

 

“Not now, son. We have to prepare,” the Grand Duchess pushed past him, so he and Lucy hurried after them once exchanging a confused look.

 

“For what?” Tirian asked as they got to Susan’s rooms. “Susan’s wedding?”

 

“Yes, and--”

 

“And what, mother?” Lucy asked, her gown flowing behind her as they chased after them.

 

“We will be having guests soon.”

 

“What do you mean?” Tirian asked. “I have heard nothing of this.”

 

“That’s because I did not tell you, son,” their mother said stiffly, which caused Tirian’s face to contort into something akin to anger. He must have been tired as being treated like a little boy when he was technically the Grand Duke since he had come of age. “The King of Narnia is coming here.”

 

Lucy and Tirian stopped dead in the hallway where their mother was hurrying Susan past the raised moldings and elaborate scrollwork of the walls. Lucy looked to Tirian and his face was still angry, maybe even angrier. “The King of Narnia? Why?” She dared to ask, her breathing becoming shorter, but not because of all the running she did.

 

“What have I told you, Lucille?” their mother snapped, pushing Susan into her apartments and standing between them, holding the door so Lucy could not get through. “Don’t ask questions!” Then she slammed the door shut, leaving Lucy and Tirian to stand there in shock.

 

Lucy felt tears come to her eyes and within seconds she was sobbing. She hated that her mother treated her thus and she hated that her sister would barely look at her after she came back from St. Staeorra’s clochar. She hated the entire situation. She wished her sister never had to get married or at least not to someone so far away.

 

Noticing her head bowed in tears, Tirian took her in his arms and said, “Do not cry, my love. It will be alright, you’ll see.”

 

“No,” said Lucy, pulling away from him. “It won’t.”

 

She ran away, back to her apartments where she bolted the door shut to her bedchamber and threw off her gown and headdress, drawing the drapes of her room tearfully and closing them around her bed before falling onto it in despair, wondering about everything.

 

Was it something the High Priestess the Fiadh had said that her dear sister wouldn’t even look at her? What  _ had _ the Fiadh said? Why wasn’t Susan looking at her? What had Lucy done?

 

Lucy laid in the darkness of her room, alone. Feeling as though she would cry more, she turned over and closed her eyes, praying to Eule with all of her heart that she would never have to marry and face whatever horrible ordeal her sister was going through. Never, she promised, never would she ever marry, for she knew she would never be happy if she did, for the kiss of the roaring, angry, silver lion were haunting her dreams once more.


	3. THREE

**BRIARGARTEN SCHLOSS**

**THE COUNTRY OF SPARE OOM**

**MARCH 2, 14,998 AC**

 

After about a month of the servants bustling about, making the already immaculate palace of Briargarten Schloss even more immaculate by polishing everything in sight, giving the flowers and vines a good sprucing up, amongst many other jobs that according to the Grand Duchess ‘had to be done before the King thought us lowly, dirty peasants’. Lucy did not see it that way, for she thought the palace looked spotless everytime she woke in the morning till she went to bed at night but perhaps she could understand her mother’s nervousness.

 

This was the Great King James XX of Narnia, a country which was richer than Spare Oom’s, though not by much the Grand Duchess liked to boast. He was a supposed great ruler and acclaimed swordsman, having been taught by the creatures of their land that Lucy had heard only stories of. She wasn’t even sure they were real.

 

Lucy didn’t figure just how ‘great’ this king was, however, when she had heard whispers amongst the servants that he had refused to arrive on March 1st, for he was distasteful towards their Mother Goddess, Eule, and March 1st was the observation of the beginning of spring and prayers of protection were said in Her name over their harvest of fruits and a great celebration was had. So instead, the King and his enormous berline that now came up the Blühen Road towards Briargarten, came on March 2nd. His berline stretched behind the King’s giant carriage house for what seemed like miles, full of so many carriages that Lucy could not even imagine that a King all needed.

 

They arrived on the late afternoon, long after the Great Hall had been transformed into a menagerie of beautiful objects, such as portraits and banners bearing their houses sigils, and large tapestries that bore various scenes from each countries religions. Lucy’s favorite was the one of Eule in the sky looking over Briargarten. She daren’t look at the one with the lion’s face. It reminded her of her haunting dream too much. Lucy had no idea on Earth how they would fit essentially one King and his whole court in their palace, as big as Briargarten was.

 

Lucy stood beside her sister, mother and brother at the head of the entire household of Briargarten where the King and his Queen would stay. They were all dressed in finery, with Lucy wearing a crushed red velvet dress with puffed sleeves and the embellished silver to show their House’s support for the Royal House of Pevensie. 

 

Beside her, Susan looked gorgeous with her raven black hair pulled back in superb braids of their House and wearing her own dress, except hers was mostly silver with red embellishments, more in the Narnian style of a kirtle over an underdress with long, dagged sleeves. The kirtle was a very discreet piece of clothing that barely covered the underdress to show the gown underneath. As their mother said about Susan’s dress, it was show the union of their two Houses.

 

The Great King James XX of Narnia was helped out of his large carriage house by his footmen, dressed in the best finery befit a King. He looked old, older than the Queen by at least five-and-ten years and larger than Lucy would have thought. He had long brown hair with many gray strands running through it; his face was hard-lined, with his finery of red with a gold cloak and gold crown beset with rubies and diamonds.

 

He turned and held his hand out to his Queen still inside the carriage house and helped her out. She was absolutely gorgeous, with hair as golden as the sun, but with the saddest blue eyes Lucy had ever seen. The Queen was obviously younger than the King, no hard lines on her face, despite the stone cold sadness marring her beautiful face. Lucy wondered how someone so beautiful and powerful could look so sad and suddenly she was worried about her sister, who would still only barely talk to her.

 

The Queen had on a red gown that was brocaded with silver lions all over it, with a silk silver kirtle over top. Her golden hair was dressed in the Narnian style, with two curled strands by her hairline hanging long down her front, by a necklace made of pure sterling silver with a lion etched into it. Lucy was sure that she and that the rest of her own family, cousins and the like of the Royal House of Schon, suddenly felt inadequate to them. A fact, Lucy was sure, irked her mother greatly, along with the fact that Spare Oom was only the  _ second _ richest country in the world, with Narnia being the first. The Grand Duchess Helena would never be the Narnian royal’s equal in that regard.

 

As soon as the King and Queen of Narnia exited their carriage house, the whole of everyone on the steps of Briargarten Schloss--including all of the cousins and friends of the Royal House of Schon--bowed or curtsied to the ground in deference. The Royal House of Pevensie did so in return, but Lucy noticed that the King and Queen of Narnia did not bow as deeply. Lucy saw that the muscle in her mother’s cheek jumped, denoting agitation, but she put on a great show.

 

Her smiled seemed almost sincere as King James climbed the steps, escorting his Queen, and embraced him as if they were old friends. “Dear James,” the Grand Duchess said as they departed. “It pleases me so that you have come to my humble home?”

 

_ Humble home? _

 

Briargarten Schloss was  _ the  _ most impressive structure in Spare Oom, with it rising in the hills of the land and it’s famed rose labyrinth; however, Lucy  _ had _ heard that Cair Paravel, the seat of the Royal House of Pevensie, was even more impressive sight to see, that not even the gleaming stone of Briargarten compared to the shining palace of Cair Paravel. King James was courteous, however, and said to her mother, “You are most kind, old friend. Your castle is a beautiful as ever, I just hope it can hold all of us.” King James laughed heartily but his Queen did not. She just stood there and stared almost blankly ahead, once glancing at Susan out of the corner of her eye.

 

“Why, yes it can, of course,” the Grand Duchess laughed as well, but there was an edge to it. She looked around and said, “Where are your sons, old friend?”

 

“They stayed in Cair Paravel,” the Queen finally spoke. Lucy looked at her and wondered, for the Queen spoke in strange lilt to the General Language they all spoke when addressing one another, for not everyone spoke High Narnian, especially Lucy. The Queen’s voice sounded almost... _ foreign _ and--and  _ dead _ . “My younger son has taken ill and my eldest insisted he stay with him.”

 

Lucy could tell her mother was disappointed by this, though she did not show it. Instead, she said, “In that case, we pray for the good health of your son, your Grace.”

 

The Queen smiled slightly. “Thank you, Your Royal Highness.” Then she held out her hand for her mother to kiss the odd ring on her finger, establishing the order of things. The ring the Grand Duchess kissed looked odd and different even to the Narnian craftsmanship. There was silence in the air as Lucy’s mother bent down and kissed the ring after a split second of hesitation, before standing back up and smiling stonily at the Queen.

 

After a moment of awkward silence, her mother spoke again. “If it please Your Grace, I will have my famed Rosenritters escort you and your entourage to your apartments.” She clapped her hands and several Rosenritters came forward, dressed in their usual livery of red and gold. They bowed to the King and Queen, and had Briargarten’s servants help the Royal’s servants unload their trunks for their fortnight stay before escorting them inside.

 

Lucy turned to go when she saw people--or  _ not _ \--appear from their own carriages and she gasped in shock. She couldn’t help herself but tug on the hem of her sister’s sleeve, asking, “What are  _ those _ ?”

 

Susan looked down at her sharply. “Shush, Lucy. It is impolite to stare.”

 

“But what  _ are _ they?”

 

“Creatures from Narnia,” Susan sniffed before following the retinue inside. Lucy stood there, staring at the amazing creatures that made their way up the steps, some with goat’s hinds or made entirely of flowers and leaves, or some actual animals that were chattering amongst themselves as they made their way up the steps; Lucy watched them go in shock, for of course she had heard the stories from her brother, but she didn’t actually think they were  _ real _ .

 

“Come, little lady,” her governess urged, pulling her inside. “We must get you ready for the masked ball tonight.”

 

“Why can’t I wear what I am wearing now?” Lucy asked, confused as to why her dress was unsuitable for a masked ball. She hated all of the dressing changes she had to do everyday, and it would be worse now that the King and Queen of Narnia were there at Briargarten Schloss.

 

“Don’t ask such silly questions, little lady,” her governess said sternly, leading her back up to Lucy’s apartments, far away from the rest of the retinue.

 

Lucy was dressed in a sky blue silk gown covered in golden crystals shaped like stars, with illuminating gold threadwork and slightly puffed sleeves where her chemise showed through where the sleeves met her bodice. Her longer brown hair was braid with golden ribbon away from her face, with her remaining hair falling slightly down her back in curls. The mask they had prepared for her was light blue and lined in five pointed gold stars across the forehead. It was a depiction of a young Eule, when she was but a small star.

 

At half past eight, the large bell tower rang, signalling the beginning of the ball. She had taken a late dinner in her rooms that afternoon and done some dismal needlepoint and spinning with some of her younger cousins after she was dressed for the masked ball, all of them gossiping about how bad Lucy was at being the daughter of a Grand Duchess.

 

None of them were discreet.

 

Lucy knew she was bad at spinning; her wool always came out clunky and uneven whilst her cousins’ came out perfect and smooth, though they were all about the same age. She was tired of their mean words and snickers when the bell tolled. At just about the same time, a knock sounded at her drawing room door, signalling that her escort to the ball was here.

 

She let her governess open the door with a curtsy, as Lucy and her cousins rose from their chairs and did the same, for her escort was her regally dressed older brother, Tirian. He was dressed in a dark blue doublet decorated down the front in silver threaded stars and his leather pants were silver as well. He wore a silver mask with white stars on either side of the eyes.

 

“Hullo, sis,” he said, smiling his charming smile and holding out an arm for her take. Lucy ignored the simpering giggles of her cousins behind her.

 

“Hullo, dear brother.” She took his arm and allowed him to take her down through the many corridors and twists and turns, through the colonnade path and past the water garden until they reached the large doors of the Great Hall. From within, Lucy could already hear laughter and music.

 

“Are you ready, sis?” Tirian asked.

 

_ No _ .

 

“Of course, brother,” Lucy tried to smile convincingly but felt like she failed. Tirian smiled sympathetically as she gold banded doors swung open. She was overwhelmed as he lead her through the throngs of people and creatures crowding the Great Hall, dancing and eating and being merry.

 

Lucy noted as they moved through the people, that the gold and red and silver melded nicely together, the colors of the Royal Houses of Pevensie and Schon. Perhaps it was a good omen from Eule, Lucy surmised as she let Tirian lead her to their mother at the top of the dias in the middle of the back of the hall, speaking with the King and Queen of Narnia, the only few people not wearing masks.

 

Lucy wished her sister was with her too as she approached them, for even though they still weren’t on the best of terms--for reasons Lucy  _ still _ did not know--her and Tirian’s presence together would have comforted her. But she could not tell where her sister was, with everybody wearing masks and unfamiliar clothes. Lucy gulped when they approached their mother and the Royals of Narnia, for she noticed they were speaking in perfect High Narnian, conversing between themselves and the King’s men. 

 

Lucy had no idea what they were saying, catching only a few words here and there that did not make sense to her.

 

The Grand Duchess finally noticed them standing there awkwardly, waiting for an acknowledgement from her. She smiled, clearly having been in her cups and said, “Ah! Here comes my youngest daughter with my heir, Tirian! Come, my daughter! Hug your mother!” Their mother spoke in the General Language, opening her arms.

 

Lucy went to her mother’s arms, allowing Tirian to stand behind them stoically. She tried to speak gaily. “How did you know it was me, Mother?”

 

The Grand Duchess Helena laughed, a rare thing. Either she was very drunk or putting on a show for the King and Queen of Narnia--probably both. “A mother always knows her children! Isn’t she a vision, Your Graces?”

 

“Yes,” the Queen smiled with an odd tilt to her mouth, like she was pained. “What is your name, little rose?”

 

“Granduchess Lucille, Your Grace,” Lucy curtsied but she was so nervous that it came out a bit clumsy and the King roared with laughter, whilst the Queen just stared at her with sad blue eyes. He said something to his men in High Narnian and they all laughed, except for the Queen and Lucy’s mother and brother, whose gazes turned steely for a moment, mirroring one another. Lucy’s face burned and she made to turn away but the King stopped her and said something in else in High Narnian to her. Lucy just stared blankly.

 

“What is wrong with this one?” The King demanded of their mother gruffly. “Does she not speak High Narnian? Your other daughter impressed me very much with the use of our vernacular.”

 

“She’s still learning, Your Grace,” her brother Tirian said stiffly, holding his arms tight behind his back, like he was restraining himself very hard from doing something, but from what Lucy could not tell.

 

“Ah, well,” the King waved his great big hand and then said something else in High Narnian and his lackeys laughed again. When they were occupied, Lucy caught her mother’s eye and she shooed her away with Tirian with a look that said ‘ _ dance _ ’. If there was one thing that would impress this ‘ _ great _ ’ King of Narnia with, it was her dancing. 

 

Lucy had always been very graceful in dancing, one of the only things that actually brought her mother any happiness and pridefulness towards her youngest. So, Lucy prided herself in that, taking extra care in her dancing lessons, learning all sorts of dances from their country, especially the ones that were the most special to her mother’s duchy, as was the Rosentanz, which was beginning it’s refrain in the hall by the spinners.

 

It was also Lucy’s favorite.

 

Tirian led her to the middle of the dance floor the moment the spinners started the song; Lucy and he began to dance around each other, with the others from Spare Oom encircling them in two lines. People looked on and stared as the people of Spare Oom went on in their traditional dance, but none was staring at anyone more than Tirian and Lucy. They seemed to be intertwined in their own world, smiling at each other and whispering sweet things and secrets as they came close each time the dance allowed it.

 

As Lucy danced, she thought she spotted her sister at the head of one of the lines near the King and Queen, dancing with a tall blonde youth covered with a mask of a red lion. It was definitely someone from the Narnian group but she was unsure why Susan was laughing and dancing with this youth when she was betrothed to someone else and so close to the King and Queen of Narnia too. A quick glance showed their mother was just as shocked.

 

“Looks like our sister is causing quite the scandal,” whispered Tirian when they got close to each other again, turning around one another once more and he took her hand secretly with a smile. She smiled back at her brother before pulling her hand away.

 

“Then how come the King and Queen don’t look scandalized?” Lucy asked.

 

Tirian chanced a look back at them, and shrugged. “Maybe this is all a ploy to test our dear sister,” he said until the dance had him moving onto to the next person.

 

Lucy watched him go until some voice spoke. “Hullo. Are we going to dance or not?” The surly voice belonged to a young boy and Lucy whirled around to look at him and almost staggered back in shock. 

 

The young boy was wearing a silver lion’s mask.

 

_ Just like her dreams _ .

 

She felt like running away but she knew she would be hearing it from her mother the next day, so instead she said, albeit shakily, “Hullo.” Then, she began to dance with him. The boy seemed to carry himself well in the dance, though his feet stumbled a bit over a few parts. Lucy couldn’t help but ask, “Are you with the Narnian party? I’m Lucy.”

 

Even though she could not see his chocolate eyes very well, she could detect that they seemed to roll back in his head and he said, “ _ Obviously _ . I’m Ed.”

 

“Pleasure,” Lucy said, but she didn’t mean it. 

 

“Likewise.” Ed didn’t seem to mean it either. The further they danced, the better he got and he eventually said in that same surly tone, “Is this what you call dancing here in Spare Oom?”

 

Lucy’s face heated. “What do you call it in Narnia, then?”

 

“Nothing so complicated.”

 

“Maybe we like complicated.”

 

“Hm.” This time, she could see crinkles in his eyes, this time denoting a smile, full-on, before he started laughing.

 

“What?” She demanded. He wouldn’t stop laughing. “What is it?!”

 

“‘ _ Maybe we like complicated _ ?’” Ed laughed at her with mirth. “You were trying to sound older than you are!”

 

“I was not!”

 

“Was too!”

 

“Was not!”

 

“Was too!”

 

They spun around fiercely, clapping their hands in unison when the dance commanded it before spinning in the opposite direction and doing the same. This irritated Lucy that the angrier they got, the more in unison they became. It was like Eule was playing some sort of cosmic joke on her, and they were beginning to attract onlookers with their fierce arguing. Some of the people were whispering amongst themselves as to why those two little children were arguing so fiercely over something so stupid, but Lucy did not care. This Ed was irritating to her no end and she wanted him to go away.

 

She wanted nothing to do with the silver lion.

 

The music finally finished with a flourish, skirts swirling and feet stopping, and the King stood up. It caused a hush amongst the people in the Great Hall. “I believe the bell has tolled from the Great Aslan himself for everyone to remove their masks, so we may EAT!” The people of Spare Oom hesitated, for they did not believe in the so called ‘great lion’, but they did as the King of Narnia did, as did the boy in front of her, but what she saw underneath was not what she expected, nor what her sister expected.

 

For underneath those masks of the two boys they were dancing with, were Crown Prince Peter of Narnia and his younger brother Prince Edmund. The people in the Hall began murmuring amongst themselves whilst the King let out a jolly sounding laugh with a twinge of deceptiveness in it, and the look on the Grand Duchess Helena could have curdled milk sour and was enough to make Lucy smile a little.

 

“Finally,” Prince Edmund said. “A smile out of you.”

 

“I’m not smiling at  _ you _ ,” insisted Lucy, glaring at him. “I’m smiling at my mother.”

 

“Well, I’m smiling at my brother and your sister--”

 

“You know who I am?” Lucy interrupted, confused as to how he would know. She did not see him amongst the guests who entered Briargarten earlier, for the Queen said they were still in Cair Paravel. A clever ploy, Lucy had to admit, for no one would have been looking for them. Lucy wondered, however, why they used this ploy.

 

“Of course,” the young Prince Edmund said arrogantly, bowing with a mocking air. He was looked about a year or two older than her and not much taller. “The Granduchess Lucille of the Royal House Schon of Spare Oom.”

 

Gritting her teeth, Lucy curtsied, much better than when she curtsied before this boy’s father and said, “Prince Edmund of the Royal House Pevensie of Narnia.” 

 

Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Susan and Prince Peter doing the same, but they had huge happy smiles on their faces and they were as red as the apples Narnia was famous for. The people in the Hall burst into applause, laughing along with the King and after a moment, the Grand Duchess began laughing too, though to Lucy, it seemed forced.

 

“May I announce,” King James XX nearly bellowed, for his face was plum with drink. “My son, the Crown Prince of Narnia, Peter of House Pevensie, and his betrothed, the Archduchess Susanne of House Schon!” He stumbled from behind the dias and grasped each of their hands, holding them up to the ceiling of the Great Hall and then putting them together, much to the applause of the people there. Susan and Peter were blushing and kept stealing glances at one another, and even Lucy couldn’t help but clap a little for her.

 

Perhaps her sister would be lucky in love.

 

“My brother looks like he’s in love already,” Prince Edmund looked like he was going to get ill staring at the two of them. In a small part of her stomach, Lucy felt the same.

 

“It is gross, isn’t it?” Tirian’s voice sounded behind Lucy and she turned around, happy for the distraction. He was standing there, his hands behind his back in his most regal fashion, a smile on his face until it landed on Edmund; it quickly turned serious and he bowed, though it felt a mockery of what he could truly do. “Your Grace,” he said.

 

“Your Royal Highness.” Edmund had the same sense of mockery in his bow and Lucy did not know what to do about it.

 

“Are you alright, sister?” Tirian asked, staring down at Edmund. Tirian was at least a foot taller than the prince, being a man grown at eight-and-ten.

 

That was a sobering thought for Lucy. Tirian would be marrying anytime soon too, and then she would be truly alone. The thought brought tears to her eyes. Her blessed brother noticed right away and took her arm, sliding his large hand into her much smaller one reassuringly. “Are you alright, sister?” She nodded her head and a tear escaped. Tirian’s eyes turned sad and he turned to Prince Edmund, who looked confused. “Excuse us, Your Grace.”

 

Prince Edmund nodded his head and Tirian led her away to a corner, where there weren’t any people from Spare Oom or Narnia whispering or gossiping about. They passed those elaborately odd creatures from Narnia and the even more elaborately looking  _ people _ from Narnia. By the time they reached the corner, Lucy was nearly sobbing.

 

Tirian took her hands in his, his face furrowed with great concern. “What is it, dear sister? Did that little prince make you cry? For I do not care if he is royaler than I, I’ll--”

 

“No!” Lucy sobbed. “It wasn’t him! It was the thought of Susan marrying and leaving and you too--”

 

“Lucy, I’m Duke of Briargarten, I’m not going anywhere,” Tirian tried to reassure her, his face screwed up now not in concern but confusion at what Lucy was saying. Even at her young age, Lucy thought that men, including her brother, were all fools.

 

“No,” she said again. “You’ll marry eventually and have no time for me anymore! No one ever has time for me anymore! I feel as though I am some sort of spirit, wading through these halls, unseen!” She started to cry again.

 

“What’s wrong with marriage? Our mother and father were very happy together, all the way until his end.”

 

“Yes, and now Mama is as frigid as ice,” Lucy could tell he knew that what she was saying was true, for his face drew in and he gripped her hands tighter.

 

Lucy looked around the Great Hall, seeing all the people feasting, drinking, dancing, and kissing in tight corners--or out in the open like the King with some woman, whilst his Queen looked on from her spot beside Lucy’s mother on the dias, a Queen made of stone. “Look at the King and Queen, even. What if Susan has an unhappy marriage like that?”

 

She and Tirian both looked to their sister, who was laughing at something Prince Peter had said whilst they sipped on wine, their faces close and blushing. Tirian laughed, “I don’t think that we’ll have to worry about that with them. Susan is lucky.”

 

“But what of me?” Lucy suddenly asked, startling her brother.

 

“Wh--what of you?”

 

“I know mother is going to marry me off one day--”

 

Tirian tried to huff a laugh. “You are criminally well informed, sis.”

 

“But what if  _ I  _ am not so lucky?”

 

Tirian’s face grew cold and clouded, marring his beautiful golden features that rivalled Prince Peter’s. Tirian pulled Lucy close into his arms, leaning down to whisper into her hair. “Well, then I intercede with you that you take vows at St. Staeorra’s, then. For if your future husband mistreats you, I will run him through with a rusty spoon.” Even though she knew he was serious, Lucy couldn’t help but giggle a little and the tension between them melted away.

 

“Oh,” she said, pulling back. “I love you big brother.”

 

Her brother’s hands held her tighter, staring deep into her twin blue eyes, that all of the siblings shared. “As I you, little sister,  _ always _ . And I promise you, that if you do not wish me to marry until you do, then I will not.”

 

Lucy’s heart leapt in her chest, love blooming like the roses their House was famous for, for the brother she loved so dearly. She hoped he would keep that promise to her and maybe, the day when they had to marry would never come.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



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